a lifetime flies but we’ll fly farther
I’ve got a lot to do in the next month and I suspect I’m not alone. This goes out to all those who wish they had a real office to get work done.
This is from the new Decemberists cd. Oh, and make sure you crank the volume. I’ve been living off this album for the past few weeks — it has been glorious:
I like ruts. I’ve found a new rut that I’ve working on since at least early summer, thanks to Chris and Adam. They’re called The Black Keys. I know this isn’t all that theological of a post, but blues rock is sublime, especially when school is getting a bit hectic. So all you writing late night papers (or in my case, cursing Latin), put these guys on and think away.
I just could not pass on posting this one. As a warning, I had to rick roll myself (one of the few times I’ll engage in the use of “the lesser of two evils”) to get Sonseed’s video out of my head before a long and largely undisturbed shift at the library’s information desk. I like my sanity thankyouverymuch.
“Jesus is a Friend of Mine” by Sonseed
The beginning of a theological response to say, 9/11, Afghanistan, Iraq, Georgia, to name a recent few, begins where the song “Gimme Shelter” lives. We’re fragile and we can do a whole lot of evil, very quickly. Technological progress has its epoch in cancer treatment and the atom bomb. Theology seeks to continually remind us that we are not divine, nor should we attempt to build our own tower of Babylon:
Oooo, a storm is threatenin’, my very life today.
If I don’t get some shelter, oh, I’m gonna’ fade away.War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.Oooo, see the fire sweeping, up every street today.
Burns like a red-coal carpet, mad bull lost it’s way.War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.Rape, murder, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
Rape, murder, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
Rape, murder, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.Oooo, a storm is threatenin’, my very life today.
If I don’t get some shelter, oh, I’m gonna’ fade away.War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
It’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.I said a love sister, it’s just a kiss away, it’s just a kiss away.
It’s just a kiss away, it’s just a kiss away, kiss away, kiss away.War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.Love sister, it’s just a kiss away, it’s just a kiss away.
Love sister, it’s just a kiss away, it’s just a kiss away.
War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
Love sister, it’s just a kiss away, it’s just a kiss away.
War children, it’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away.
Love sister, it’s just a kiss away, it’s just a kiss away.
I’ve been told that in the 60s and 70s, it was music that changed things. It was music that stopped the war. Now whether this is true or not doesn’t particularly matter to me. The point is, and I believe it was Dylan saying this in the documentary No Direction Home, that music has lost its power. The ability for music to change things is gone for now, or it has been significantly diminished.
Being something of a youngster, having not lived through the 60s and 70s, I have a hard time understanding this idea that music has been diminished. For me, it has always been that way. The notion that music could bring world leaders to their knees seems impossible, they seem too well insulated — or simply do not care. Even today, with the Foo Fighters singing of conflict with the state for speaking out seems entirely plausible, not because music today will provoke such a response (after all, this is a mainstream band who lives a comfortable life while playing to an image of revolution), but because the state naturally responds with tactical force. Its as if the revolutionary songs of today are a lament or a dream. The world is not as it was.
With music diminished and blunted, by capitalistic forces that commodifies revolutionary change, where do social forces lie? Where is the power to change, to halt the army in its tracts as it rattles its sabers and moves toward war? I am beginning to believe it is in interreligious dialogue.
It is no secret, for anyone paying attention to the news, that the current American administration was and continues to saber rattle against Iran. The rhetoric has picked up, even while there is a certain shift toward diplomacy. In fact I remember a month or two back reading an article comparing the rhetoric before this Iraq war and the rhetoric today on Iran. The comparisons were striking.
One might say, the democrats would never let such a thing happen. And my answer would be, you really want to risk that? After all, Bush is still in office. They feed off one another. However, religions do not have to feed off the state. In fact, discussion between religions can show us how human we all are, as opposed to how powerful we are.
The point here is not to use interreligious dialogue to convert, or even to change others (this is afterall dialogue), but merely for the idea of exposure and connection. Globalization is in itself an ambiguous thing, however right now it is run by those who think of money first. What if religion, or at least Christianity, were to take the connections that globalization makes available and rub shoulders with everyone else. The more connections we make, the more the reality of other people’s humanity is made evident, and the harder I think it would be for us to wage an electronic war on a demonized people because our government wants us to.
At the same time, we can give the finger to the enlightenment story that religion is the cause of war and conflict. We could effectively bring home the idea that people around the globe are people and they are our neighbors. In a very real sense, the church would be fulfilling its role as a peace maker and keeping at least our warring state in check, which music did, while also living with those people of other colors, which music did not seem to move us towards.
Oh, and for grins, here is a great link from the BBC of a Capuchin monk heading up a heavy metal band. Who says monks don’t rock?
I got memed in for a music list of sorts, a list of one’s favorite albums from each year that one has been alive. Well, there is something wrong with me. I am terrible, terrible, at keeping track of band names and associating the names with the songs, much less years when albums came out. After much searching through the internet of favorite bands, and again cursing the eighties for being a terrible decade (more on that later), I’ve been able to come up with this list:
1983: U2, War
1984: The Cars, Hearbeat City (A tribute to crappy music and sycophantic lyrics.)
1985: The Cure, The Head on the Door (A tribute to the death of the drummer during the eighties. What so bad about drummers that the eighties decided to kill them off?)
1986: Bon Jovi, Slippery When Wet (STEEEEEEL HORSE IIIIIIIIII RIDEEEEEEEE!)
1987: Rick Astley, Never Gonna Give You Up – Rick Rolled!
1988: Poison, Open Up and Say… Ahh! (Proof that “success” by being a sellout doesn’t get you anywhere.)
1989: Queen, The Miracle
1990: Michael W. Smith, Go West Young Man (A tribute to the fact that I didn’t know any better back then. I was only seven for God sakes.)
1991: R.E.M., Out of Time
1992: Yo-Yo Ma and Emanuel Ax playing Johannes Brahms Sonatas for Cello and Piano (This is beauty.)
1993: Counting Crows, August and Everything After (Hey, the early 90s was a hard time for music.)
1994: Queen, Greatest Hits (Because most came before my time.)
1995: Jars of Clay, Jars of Clay
1996: Cake, Fashion Nugget
1997: Sixpence None the Richer, Sixpence None the Richer
1998: Burlap to Cashmere, Anybody Out There?
1999: Switchfoot, New Way to Be Human
2000: Switchfoot, Learning to Breathe (I like ruts. And besides, they were my favorite band for a long time.)
2001: Five O’Clock People, In the Bleak Midwinter (Teh Awesome.)
2002: Damien Rice, O
2003: Sufjan Stevens, Michigan
2004: Lovedrug, Pretend You’re Alive
2005: The Decemberists, Picaresque
2006: Grand Funk Railroad, Greatest Hits (I had to work them in somehow, even if this is cheating.)
2007: Feist, The Reminder
2008: Five O’Clock People, Temper Temper
About the eighties, I see so very little of it to be redeeming. In fact, I commonly say, I am glad my youngest years were in the eighties, so I didn’t waste a decade with memories of bad synth music, neon with abandon, and Regan economics (*zing*). So I didn’t like the eighties, sue me. For above, I had also had a devil of a time trying to find for 1994 and 2007.
As for continuing on the meme, I tag people I think who would have a much better grasp of music: Chris, Ben, Adam, Michael, and Ry.
Five O’Clock People is back after five and a half years gone. I’m giddy all over. They released a new cd last night and you can hear a lot of the new songs here.
Also, below is a video of them last night going through one of their old songs, “Blame.” The mixing could be better, but this is supposed to be a rough teaser anyways. Still, give ‘em a chance and I think you’ll be pleased.
I suppose I’m forming an informal series on intense personal pain. I’ve got three other posts here, here and here.
As I try to work out faith and life, I keep finding holes and flaws in American Christianity and so I attempt to fill the gaps or correct the theological warping. Some ways I change are through theological constructions and seeking out the conclusions (which is more often than not, other people). But there are also works outside of Christian theology where one can find rest.
Finding places of rest cannot be underestimated. Some places are between the hurting human and the divine, but there are also other places that deal with the situation of pain but are reflections by humans on these human experiences and sometimes may indirectly lead us back to the divine.
I have found some rather helpful, “current” works and figured I would mention a couple of them for the benefit of those who are searching who are likewise in pain. But by all means, anyone with a suggestion please leave a comment.
In the middle of this past August, Kenneth Branaugh’s Hamlet was finally released on dvd and I got myself a copy. I was already a huge fan of the play and this movie’s interpretation ever since high school, but now I find this work incredibly helpful, especially disc 1. Father murdered by the brother. Brother now becomes king and very quickly marries widowed queen. Son Hamlet is also rejected by Ophelia, while he reals from the parental problems and whether or not Hamlet will take revenge. And in all this, Branaugh does an excellent job.
Kaddish by Leon Wieseltier is nearly 600 pages of mourning, in all its fluctuating manic glory. You can pick it up and start reading almost anywhere and put it down whenever you want. There is no push to read an argument or finish a plot, but instead to see that the fellow anguished exist in highs and lows as well. This is Jewish grief expertly written. And all the heartache aside, Wieseltier tells some really good history stories within the text, as he searches his Jewish tradition.
And there is always some melancholic music. I suggest Brahms Cello Sonatas.
One of my favorite bands of all times is back together. Yes, they’re back and I know this because their myspace page says so. What band is it you say? Why its Five O’Clock People of course and best of all, a cd is in the works. The website says they had time in June to record. Woo hoo!
Only recently have I returned to their music, after a year or so on hiatus from music in general and more life experience (including that storm I mentioned earlier a few posts ago), their music has taken on a near mythic quality, its at least certainly cathartic and haunting – if not personality shaping (in a good way). Anyways, I could go on for pages about their music, nonetheless, if you want to know what the band is about, I suggest giving a listen to In the Bleak Midwinter with special emphasis on, In the Bleak Midwinter, Sorry and Glass (but don’t forget the other songs, they’re great as well). However, by far and away, my favorite song and most apt for a relationship – both as a description of a proper relationship, but also an eschatological envisioning of where relationships ought to go – is House of God.
There has been talk around the theoblogosphere about creating a new meme. I have an idea: In your opinion, theologically, what is the worst song, ever? And why?
Now I elect to stay away from songs of worship like hymns or modern day worship songs, mainly because I’m not interested age-old debates like Calvinism vs. Arminianism. Actually this is really an excuse to talk about one of my least favorite song. Ever. However, everyone else, feel free to name your own least favorite, and then a song to replace it.
My father came into town this last Friday and we went to see the Yankees get beat by the Mets up at Yankee stadium (much to the disappointment of my father), even with Clements pitching. During the seventh inning stretch, the people in-charge played the ever so popular “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” song over the speakers, but then a second song, one that churns up a deeply-rooted negative emotions inside of me, was played – “God, bless America.” Now of course this reaction stems from the critique about the nation-state, yoking church with violence, nationality vs. ecclesiology, blah blah blah. Same old stuff really. Good stuff, but not particularly new stuff if you know me or have read this blog much. My single greatest objection to the song is to the idea of a divinely sanction modern nation-state. So how about God blesses all people? That sounds like something God really does like to do. Since when were we ever so good to be divinely sanctioned, or even actually graciously blessed above all the other nations? Stupid false myths. We’re “blessed” because we have taken from the poor and killed many others for our “freedom” and “liberty” – our riches are blood money.
Anyways, I do have a song to suggest, and a song that in fact proceeded “God, Bless America” by five minutes at Yankee stadium – “You Shook Me All Night Long.” Yep, you read it right. It was only a couple months ago that I first really paid attention to the lyrics. Good lord it was nearly scandalous. Funny enough though, and perhaps not all that surprising, I can find a theological parallel – “Song of Songs.” Honestly, the only reason we do not blush the hues of the sun when we read that book in the Bible is because we don’t understand really what “his banner over me is love” really means. Yes, next time at church, when people up on stage sing that song, you can see how much we misunderstand the text. So “his banner” means God’s protection for us? Right…. See what happens when the church acts repressive? We miss the erotic power, we cleave off parts of our humanity – vitality and zest (the spices of life if you will), and get that god awful “Christian dating/courtship” subculture.
I “create” the podcasts here at Union now. I say this because soon I’ll be posting up a podcast that should help open one’s eyes to spices in the Bible.
As I look around the theoblogosphere, I’ve noticed that the title for this blog might seem odd, or even perhaps patronizing, in comparison to other titles. It is also not very descriptive up front, so here is my effort to give a better descriptive identity to a blog titled flying.farther.
I got the title from my favorite Jars of Clay song. I do like a lot of other music, instead of “Christian Music,” like: the Decemberists, Death Cab for Cutie, Crosstide, Queen, Lovedrug, and moody, slow Chopin sonatas and preludes. However, this Jars song has got to be one of my favorite songs. I highly suggest that one gives it a listen somehow, it was in the White Elephant sessions cd.
As you will probably notice over time, I really, and I mean really, like ecclesiology. I titled the blog “flying.farther” because with a creative interpretation, the song can be understood as a relational reading of the body of Christ — we love one another through this life and onto the next, inspite of the pain associated with the fallen world. Also, it has a depiction of solidarity with the dead: heartfelt rememberance. The outcome of the reading is that I myself do not move farther, but rather we all grow old together, moving farther into the promises of God and the Divine itself.
Flying Farther
He picked her up some flowers
On a sunday afternoon
They sat out on the porch swing
Underneath the cresent moon
Life times seemed to pass
Staring at the skies
And on the swing he gave her the ring
There were tears in her eyes
He said I pray I’m not alone
In my dreams about forever
You and I could become one
And always be together
We’d grow old and wise
Through all the days
For worse or for better
And now the truth cause I love you
Even now more than ever
And a lifetime flies but we’ll fly farther
Into the night where the eyes of loneliness can never bother
All our dreams of together uneclipsed by never never
Lifetime finds it’s in your eyes, but we’ll fly farther
Fifty years have ridden off into the sunset
And the tears that we have cried have overflown
Here we are counting scars, wounds of life and ending upsets
Your with me and I’m with you and I will never forget
Lifetime flies but we’ll fly farther
Into the night where the eyes of loneliness will never bother
All our dreams of together uneclipsed by never never
Lifetime finds it’s in your eyes, but we’ll fly farther
He picked her up some flowers
On a sunday afternoon
He rode the Grayhound bus past the house they used to swoon
He knelt beside the grave, hung his head, a teardrop fell
And on the stone the epitaph shone the words he knew so well…
Lifetime flies but we’ll fly farther
Into the night where the eyes of loneliness will never bother
All our dreams of together uneclipsed by never never
Lifetime finds it’s in your eyes, but we’ll fly farther
Lifetime flies but we’ll fly farther
Into the night where the eyes of loneliness will never bother
All our dreams of together, uneclipsed by never never
Lifetime finds it’s in your eyes, but we’ll fly farther
We’ll fly farther
We’ll fly farther
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